1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a method for controlling print setting, and a control method therefor.
2. Description of the Related Art
When a host computer instructs a printer to perform printing, various items regarding printing, such as a type and a size of paper, the number of prints, and a layout, can be set by using a printer driver installed in the host computer.
In a user interface (UI) disposed in such a printer driver, in many cases, setting items regarding printing are categorized into a tab format as illustrated in FIGS. 3A and 3B. For example, a tab 301 in FIG. 3A integrates setting items such as a type of paper 303 and a color adjustment 304 that relate print quality, and a tab 302 in FIG. 3B integrates setting items such as a size of paper 305 and a direction 306 that relate a page layout.
Categorizing the setting items into a plurality of tabs enables checking of functions provided by the printer driver while collating them with function fields to which they belong. As a result, a user who is not accustomed to the printer driver can understand the functions.
Additionally, a user knowledgeable about functions themselves but unaccustomed to the user interface of the printer driver can approximately guess a place where a setting changing unit of the functions is disposed.
The method is not limited to that described above, and items may be further categorized into a basic setting group and an application setting group, and arranged in a hierarchical manner.
Print setting in an initial status where the printer driver is installed (setting at the time of shipping) is preset to a frequently used combination or a combination for exhibiting printer performance in a balanced manner.
Thus, to prepare for a case where the user wishes to constantly apply setting that is different from the initial setting, an operating system (OS) such as Windows (registered trademark) 2000, XP, or Vista provided by Microsoft Corp., based on a multi-user environment has a function of storing a desired setting combination as default setting for each user account.
When application software gives a printing instruction, the application software changes setting for necessary items, and issues a printing job by directly using default print setting information obtained from the printer driver for other setting items.
Thus, the storage of setting desired by the user as default setting for the items that is not changed by the application software by using the function of the OS enables saving time and labor for changing setting for each printing, greatly improving efficiency of printing work.
In the conventional user interface categorizing the setting items, types of setting items belonging to categories are constant, and many items are set for dealing with various printing purposes. On the other hand, functions that the user wishes to use are generally limited to some specific items for each printing purpose.
For example, when wishing to make quick and easy checking, an entire content of a document is printed with “draft quality” and “4-page allocation setting”. When wishing to print a snapshot, the printing is performed with setting such as “paper type for photo”, “paper size for photo”, and “borderless”.
In many cases, therefore, a desired setting item has to be found among many items, and a tab has to be switched to set items when desired items belong to a plurality of categories.
When items are arranged in a hierarchical manner based on a dependant relationship among settings, the items have to be set in order from a high class. Thus, this operation unit is not necessarily easy to use.
Under these circumstances, a user interface customizing method that displays only setting items selected by a user has been developed.
Another method has been developed, which uses a function of the OS for storing setting to be used at the moment as default setting in the user account. Thus, time and labor for changing setting for each starting of the application software to perform printing can be saved.
However, when there is a plurality of combinations of frequently used print settings, in other words, a plurality of printing purposes, default setting has to be changed beforehand each time a printing purpose changes, or setting has to be changed to desired print setting for a specific print item after a start of the application software.
Thus, for example, as discussed in Japanese Patent Application Laid-Open No. 2000-222159, printer drivers that have own functions of storing a plurality of presets (patterns) of combinations of desired print settings have widely been marketed.
Desired print settings can be applied altogether only by selecting and reading one of the presets stored beforehand after the user interface of the printer driver is loaded from the application software.
As a result, as long as presets can be stored for all the assumed printing purposes, the aforementioned problem can be solved.
However, it is only direct use of one of the combinations of stored prescribed values that is effective for reducing complexity of an operation. In other words, in the case of an unexpected printing purpose or special printing, to make a certain change from a prescribed value stored as a preset, a user must change desired setting by switching a tab or a hierarchy while being aware of a category.
If there is a possibility of using a result of partly changed settings, each combination of setting values after the change has to be stored. As a consequence, a complex operation cannot be eliminated.
When the user interface (UI) is customized to display only setting items selected beforehand by the user, even if items to be changed belong to a plurality of categories, desired printing can be set by a relatively small number of operation steps.
Generally, however, setting items that the user wishes to change vary depending on printing purposes. When the user interface is customized to deal with all the purposes, each time printing is carried out, many unnecessary setting items for the printing purpose are displayed. As a consequence, the user has to perform complex setting.